A Graph is Worth a Thousand Words

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April 20, 2020 – Last week, an Atlantic City Surrogate called to reopen New Jersey immediately. On Friday, a Toms River woman was charged with violating coronavirus outbreak emergency orders when she organized a protest against Governor Phil Murphy’s executive orders in Trenton.

MSNBC put together a graph that I thought was pretty telling. The graph showed the total US coronavirus deaths since Feb. 28, 2020. As you can see below, essentially, the United States had a very small number of deaths from coronavirus for the most part in March. However, the number jumped to 1,574 on March 27th. In the short three weeks since then, the total deaths jumped to 32,356 (as of April 17).

Graph is courtesy of MSNBC.com

I thought it will be interesting to see a comparable graph for the State of New Jersey. Some of you may remember that Governor Phil Murphy signed Executive Order No. 107 (“E.O. 107”) on March 21, 2020 ordering shelter in place in addition to social distancing. One week before that E.O. 107, New Jersey reported 1 coronavirus death in the state. On March 21st, the day of E.O. 107 ordering shelter in place, there were 16 reported coronavirus deaths.

One week after that, coronavirus deaths jumped to 140. Two weeks later, that number was up to 846. Three weeks later, that number jumped again to 2,183. As of Saturday night (April 18), four weeks later, that number jumped again to 4,070. See graph below.

So, in the short 4 weeks since Executive Order #107 and with social distancing and shelter in place, the total number of coronavirus deaths here in New Jersey jumped significantly from near zero!

The take away from these two graphs? Coronavirus can hit pretty fast, especially when unchecked. By the time we realize that it’s bad, it may be too late and it could overwhelm our healthcare capacity to deal with the infected cases.

The Governor of Illinois was reported as sending a secret flight to China to get personal protective equipment (“PPE”) for health workers. Why the stealth mission? Illinois was concerned that the U.S. federal government would seize the shipment since there are a number of reports that documented federal efforts to seize PPE for the near empty national stockpile, even intercepting orders and diverting orders without explanation.

Just yesterday, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, a Republican and chair of the National Governor Association, dismissed as “absolutely false” Trump administration claims that states have adequate coronavirus testing capacity to begin reopening their economies. He went on to described the lack of testing as the biggest problem in the nation since the coronavirus pandemic hit the United States.

It seems clear that we still have a shortage of PPE for our frontline workers and there is still woefully inadequate testing (and therefore data) to let healthcare experts and elected officials to truly assess the status of the coronavirus.

Social distancing and shelter in place are hard. Residents are getting cabin fever and going stir-crazy. Small businesses are really hit hard. However, until there is sufficient testing and/or vaccines and treatment are commercially available, social distancing and shelter are the only effective plans against the coronavirus pandemic.

What was Governor Murphy’s response to the call to reopen New Jersey? “That is irresponsible,” said Murphy at the end of his daily press briefing. He went on to say “We quote-unquote untie the system right now, there will be blood on our hands. And I want to make sure folks understand that. This is literally life and death.”

Stay home, stay safe and stay healthy!